My wife and I are planning our Europe trip and have planned to be in Paris from June 6 - June 12. We just realized UEFA Euro 2016 will be hosted in France from June 10 - July 10.
Should we move Paris a week earlier in our itenerary to avoid the crowds that Euro Cup might bring?
Thanks for the help!
According to the UEFA official schedule, for your dates, there are matches in Paris or Saint-Denis (which is essentially Paris) on 6/10 and 6/12. So really only one day of your dates would be affected as you plan on leaving Paris on the 12th anyway.
http://www.uefa.com/MultimediaFiles/Download/competitions/General/02/09/59/58/2095958_DOWNLOAD.pdf
If that direct link doesn't work, go to the main site and then click on "EURO 2016 MATCH SCHEDULE."
Why not join in the fun instead of avoiding it? I was in Germany during a prior World Cup and the atmosphere was fantastic...since I am a soccer fan, I saw it as a positive aspect.
I am planning a graduation trip with my 18 year old son and I plan to try to schedule it so we can attend a match or two. I think the crowds around the stadium will be significant but I don't think the tourist areas will be overcrowded because of the Euro Cup.
I would avoid it if there are matches in Paris. Hotels will be very crowded and priced at profiteering levels. Transport may be overcrowded and heavy-handed policing may cause disruption to non-football-fans travelling. There's also always the possibility of fan violence which has never really gone away - Chelsea fans hit the headlines recently in Paris when they kicked a local black resident off a Metro train (stationary and in a station) while racially abusing him.
Buying tickets for any games depends on a lottery which is already taking registrations. Early games may be a little bit more accessible, played in several other cities as well as Paris, but if you luck out and get a ticket it may not be in the city you prefer. The Euro cup has developed the nice tradition of fans gathering in public squares to watch the later games on big public TV screens, maybe as close as the casual fan can get to the action. Studies have shown that these big public spectacles, such as the World Cup final or the Olympics, scare off more tourists than are attracted, so that hotel occupancy in the last week may fall below normal. The prices won't drop, though -- that's the best bet of all.
Hi daneS:
I was in Paris in July 1998 during which time the semi-final and final match of the World Cup were played. I had a real blast watching these on the large screen at city hall and near the Eiffel Tower. Since I had booked my hotel (a one or two star) in early 1998 and since I dined at budget priced restaurants I did not feel that I was negatively impacted by what crowds there were and that I was being gouged in any away. I also attended the Winter Olympics in Vancouver in 2010 and the Summer Olympics in London in 2012, and, except for riding the tube to specific game venues and visiting some of the national hospitality houses, did not feel impacted by the crowds. In fact, the thinking during the Summer Games is that because normal tourists were avoiding the city and because the sports fans were somewhat single minded and did not care much about what London has to offer the tourists who showed up found relatively empty restaurants, hotels, and tourist sites. My suggestion is to visit Paris as planned and go with the flow.
Paris is a big city that is always crowded with tourists and this is high season for hotel costs etc. I would not hesitate to be there although it is wise to line up lodging early. The people crowding into town for the matches are probably not crowding into the Louvre, or similar venues. I wouldn't give it a thought. There are convention times in Paris that us outsiders are not even aware of that also affect hotels -- just line up your lodging early and go when it pleases you. This is not going to have a big impact on what you do as a tourist.
